Postcard Mailing Campaign Design and Printing for Success

Postcards are an often used yet often undervalued marketing tool. Many small businesses skimp on the design because they expect to pay a lot for the printing. Since they think of a postcard as being more disposable than other marketing tools, they’re trying to keep their costs as low as possible. Recently, I had the opportunity to show one of my clients just how the right combination of good design and printing sourcing can turn that thinking around.

Dean of Oregon Beach Vacations needed to create a set of three postcards to highlight different aspects of Oregon Coast Beach Vacations. He wanted to draw reciepients out to the coast, and, of course, to call on him to help them plan their vacations. His plan was to send the cards out in three seperate mailers, so the postcards needed a similar look and feel without being so identical they didn’t grab attention.

My solution was to search for high-quality imagery, the kind that generates a strong emotional response. I found what I was looking for on Shutterstock for about $50, a low price to pay for the level of imagery we got. From there, I designed around the images, using the same fonts and general graphics across all three postcards and varying the colors to underscore the emotional message. Dean’s team delivered the copy with each image in mind, making it a perfect match for the design of each card. In the end, his postcards reflected the bright and exciting nature of his campaign and company. From a design perspective, they shined.

The place where Dean, and so many other clients in the past, was expecting to spend was in printing. He’d gotten several quotes from bulk mailers and printers, and he was expecting to pay big bucks until he talked with me. I quoted him a total price considerably lower than the printing quotes he’d already gotten. With the savings I could get for him, he came out ahead even after factoring in the mailing costs he’d still need to cover. I ordered 45,000 cards with two versions of each card, met his deadlines, kept the overall cost under budget, and showed him that the extra cash he spent in design time and imagery gave him a more professional, effective postcard than the competition. For both of us, this was a truly winning project.